I don't know how long we stayed like that.  Simply just hugging, in the middle of a dark alley.  I don't care how long it was, I could stay like this for another three hours.  What happens now?  Where do we go from here?

When Kai eventually pulls away, he gazes at me with an unreadable expression.  His hands are still hanging loosely around me, and I can see his jaw clenching and unclencing, his Adam's apple bobbing unsurely as his eyes fix themselves on me.  What, I wanted to ask.  Don't just look at me like that.  Tell me what you’re thinking of.

"What took you so long?"  I ask again, still hypnotized by his eyes. 

"I was in the car."  He confesses.  "I was on my phone and I sort of lost track of time... it was about 15 minutes after you left when I realized you still weren't back.  I drove here immediately."

I swallow.  "A little later and--"

"Don't even mention it."  Kai hisses, his eyebrows furrowing.  "Never, you hear me?  I'd never allow that."

I nod, casting my eyes down to his hands that are now clutching mine.  His fingers entangled in mine. 

"But you know him."  I state, lifting my gaze back up. "The guys."

Kai sighs.  "Yes." 

"How?"

It's Kai's turn to cast his eyes downwards.  "Work."

"Liar."

He looks up at me.  "I just ran into some of those guys.  I-- it was a long time ago.  Um, bad.. decisions and stuff." 

"What bad decisions?"  I press on. 

"Just.. stupid choices I met... and therefore stupid friends I made..."

"And what was that agreement about?" 

"Just... a promise to not get rash between one another, really..."

"Liar."  I say again, feeling anger bubble in me.  Kai hangs his head in silence. 

"You can't tell me about it, can you?"  I ask, snapping a bit.  "You can't even ing explain one single thing.  After all he did to me, I don't deserve to know." 

"It's not that I don't want to tell you... I just can't."  Kai shakes his head helplessly. 

I laugh humorlessly.  "And you can't tell me why I was being repeatedly referred to as 'your ' either, I guess?  Or your , your --"

"Stop.  Stop."  Kai says, gritting his teeth.  "It means nothing.  You're not any of that, and he was just drunk so--"

"And I don't think you'd tell me who's this Minah, Kai?  Because I've heard of her.  I've heard her name before.  I wonder when..."  

"She's no one."  Kai answers quickly, his eyebrows furrowing.  "Honest.  She's no one important." 

"You her, don't you?" I ask before I can stop myself, the words like bile in my mouth. 

"I..."  Kai stops.  It's true.  For some reason, I feel my heart being shredded to pieces.  I drop my head and rest my back on the wall.  It hurts.   Everything and Kai's an and it hurts to hear his silence. 

"You her.."  I whisper, shaking my head.  Why is this news affecting me so much?  For some reason, I can’t imagine him with another woman in bed, skin to skin and mouth to mouth—.  Just…. .   Why can't I just take it easily? 

"She's really no one important, Iseul."  Kai repeats.  But I’m not having any of it.

“Really?  Or is it just because you don’t want to tell me?”  I say, fire in my eyes.  “Because I’m just your , Kai?”

“Seo Iseul!!” He yells, and despite my burning anger, I jump a little. 

“What?”  I taunt, raising my chin defiantly.

“Don’t you ing ever..” he growls, inching his face closer and effectively pinning me on the wall, “use that word to refer to yourself ever again.  If anyone here is my , she most definitely isn’t you, you got that?” 

“Then?  Who is she?”  As his professional, hired babysitter, I fully know that I have absolutely no right to be asking this, but knowledge isn’t stopping me this time.  In fact, nothing is, because I went there already. 

“She’s nobody, Iseul.  I swear.”  Kai’s eyes have gone all soft and syrupy again.  He takes hold of my hands and I feel my heart beginning to drum in my chest.  "Trust me, she's nothing like..."

He slowly raises his hand and gently the side of my cheek, up to my temples, right beside the trail of blood.   I feel my heart speeding up to the moon again at the feeling of his thumb grazing delicately on my skin, like I was fine china.  Like what?  What is he trying to say?   Kai bites his lips and sighs.  "Let's get this fixed."

"You really can't tell me?!"  I cry, tears welling up in my eyes.  Kai's eyes widen and immediately his other hand squeezes mine. 

"Iseul..."  He whispers, one hand resting gently on my cheek with his thumb caressing it, the other squeezing my hand.  “Don’t cry.  Please, don’t cry.” 

I only sob a little louder.  My heart aches so ing badly!  What is this?  What is he making me feel?  It’s burning in me, it’s filling up my chest like ink spreading in water and all I want is for him to just pull me in and hug me and let our feelings burn and collide and let these emotional dams break until all that’s left is…

Is…

Us?

His words are b with emotions that he can't seem to let free and for some reason, I can feel them.  Oh, if he knew the things he does to my heart when he looks at me that way.  If only he knew the the things he makes me feel whenever he touches me.  I look away and press my eyes shut.  

"It's fine."  I say softly at last.  "I don't deserve to know.  I'm just a babysitter." 

"You don't--"  Kai bites his lip harder, obviously frustrated.  "Don't say that." 

"You don't say the things I want to hear either."

"It's complicated."

I burst out laughing.  "It sure as is, isn't it?  That's what all you guys say when you're too lazy to explain."

"I can't.."  Kai says, almost begging.  His eyes are tugging at my heartstrings.  "I can't..."

I sigh, closing my eyes.  "Fine."  I struggle to get up.  Goddamn, stupid thug, throwing a whole person down and ...

"Where are you going?"  Kai asks, his hands latching on mine instantly.

"Home.  I don't know."

"You're not mad?" He asks cautiously.  "I thought you were..."

"Mad?  I am, Kai.  Of course I am."  I look him dead in the eye.  "I want you to tell my why what just happened to me happened, and you say you can't.  What kind of bull is that?"

Kai stays silent.  "But I...." he whispers.

"But I'm not mad enough to leave."  I say, gently moving my hands to hold his.  "Because you saved me, and that's the important part."

Kai blinks.  "You're not leaving." He says, confirming.

I shrug.  "You're not telling me something about yourself, Kai.  That's what I think.  And if my suspicions continue to be proven correct, and you still can't tell me what the hell it is, I'm just going to have to find out for myself, I guess." 

Kai raises one eyebrow.  "Why not leave? That would be easier."

"Oh, so now you want me to leave."

"That's not what I meant."

"Then what do you mean?"

"What I mean is..."  Kai takes a deep breath and exhales slowly.  "Why are you sticking with me?  You heard what he said.  I'm a ed up ." 

I close my eyes and ask myself why indeed.  I know why.  I know exactly why, but no way am I telling him why.  I can't, you know?  I can't even tell myself why.  Just like he can't. 

"Because I like Jongguk." 

"You're willing to stay for my son?"  He asks, arching his eyebrows higher. 

"Well.  Why else?  I'm a babysitter.  That's what I'm supposed to stay for."  I shrug, trying to play it cool.  Kai looks at me warily.  "Right?"  I ask, ignoring my protesting heart. 

Kai nods once.  "If that's what you want." 

Everything he says is Greek to me.  My chest aches with something, something I'm not sure I want to admit, and I resist the urge to just run and cry already.  I want to kick myself and yet hug someone all at once.  Why am I so ing weak?!  Why do I catch feelings when the simplest things happen to me?!  Kai would save any girl from getting .  He might also hug them as well, to calm their nerves.  That's normal human response.  But what it's doing to me and my goddamnedly stupid heart, I can't even begin to explain.  I'm not sure if my heart is even beating anymore.  One thing I know for sure is that I feel so... so... strongly for Kai.  I don't even know what the feeling is.  You'd say it's love.  But it's not a pleasant, endearing kind of love.  I'm not even sure if it's love, or at least like, for that matter.  It's anger, it's desperation, it's need and want and restrainment AND GODDAMN, IT ING ACHES.  It's a nuclear bomb. 

Pushing all my emotions down my throat and putting a lid on it, I try to smile brightly.  "So can we go home now?"

"Are you kidding me?" Kai asks, his normal self seeming to return already. 

"Um.. I take it that's a yes?"

"That's a no, woman.  Absolutely not.  We're taking care of that bleeding on your head first."

"It's not like I cracked my skull open or anything Kai, I just scratched the part near my hairline.  It's fine." 

"By scratch, I think you meant tore open, and if it happened to me, then it'd be okay, but you," he points at me, "you don't have sufficient experience with this to tell me that it's fine."

And he's fully back.  The snarky, bossy old Kai.  The spell has been broken and although my chest still hurts, I feel it relaxing a bit.  See?  It's not love.  It was something big, yes, and I know that it'll always be hiding somewhere inside of me, between the spaces of my ribcage, but it's not something as powerful and alive as love.  Controlling them seems a lot more easier now. 

"Then what are you going to do?  Take me to the hospital?"

"Do you want me to?"

"No.  Honestly, it's not that bad!"

"Then let's just get some help from the convenience store you went to.  There's bound to be some first aid kit in there."

"You have a first aid kit at home, if that's what you're looking for."  I remind him. 

"Yeah, but we need one pronto."  Kai starts walking towards K-mart.  "Can you walk?"

"If I couldn't, can we just drive home in your car?" 

"No, I'd carry you to K-mart."  Kai narrows his eyes slightly.  "I'm serious about this, Iseul."

THUMP.  THUMP.  THUMP.

"F-fine."  I try to prevent colour creeping to my cheeks, if that's even biologically possible.  "Let's go."

We start walking to the convenience store a couple of meters away from here.  Kai pushed the door open and pulls me in behind him.  An electronic bell chimes and wakes the cashier on duty up fully. 

"Hello."  Kai says.  "Do you have a first aid kit we could use?"

"Sorry, we don't sell any first aid kits here but if you want some Betadine or band aids they're--"

"We don't want to buy them-- we need them now."  Kai whips me around him and presents me to the dude behind the cashier, doing it somewhat patronizingly.  "What do you use in the case of emergencies?"

"Oh God."  The guy instantly disappeared behind the counter that for a stupid moment I thought he fainted at the sight of my wound and began thinking it actually looked much worse than what I predicted.  But then he resurfaced with a first aid box, popping back up like a mole in those Whack-a-Mole thingys, that I turn convinced that the would has indeed affecting my thinking/brain capacity.

"Thank you."  Kai says, taking it from him before he could even do anything.  Opening the box and taking out some cotton, iodine solution and a bandaid, Kai begins working on me like a professionally trained first aid expert.  He's a sight to behold.  His fingers flutter automatically around every item, demonstrating more knowledge and confidence than me, when even I was on the first aid team all throught high school. 

"Do you have any water?"  He asks the cashier dude--Jinyoung, from his nametag--who's staring at Kai in obvious fascination as well.

"Back there for--"

"Free water.  Dude, she's injured and you're making her pay to get treated?  I thought only hospitals had the right to do that."  Kai says, glaring with half of his maximum intensity.  Jinyoung immediately presents Kai with his own water bottle.  Poor little Jinyoung.  He just had to be on the night shift today.  More like night .  I giggle a little to myself and Kai immediately turns to me. 

"What is it now?  Did that bump affect your sanity?"

"Nothing."  I smile.  "Stupid internal joke I share with myself." 

The upper corners of Kai's mouth lifts slightly.  "Keep still.." 

He first washes the blood away with water, before sterilizing it and finally dabbing Betadine on a piece of cotton and sealing it over my wound with a band-aid.  I wince slightly.  Kai glances at me, and I can see with his trembling fingers that he's being as gentle as possible. 

"There." 

I smile at him, shaking my head a bit so that my hair would cover the gash on my head.  "Thanks."  I turn to Jinyoung too.  "Thank you, too!  I'm sorry we had to use your water.  I really had no problem with buying some; I was sort of thirsty as well." 

"You're thirsty?"  Kai asks me, knitting his brows.  "Why didn't you say so?!"

I blink rapidly.  "Umm..."

Somebody explain why every single thing I do is a mistake to Kai??

Without waiting for an answer, Kai strides off to the refridgerator and starts picking out some beverages.  "Sorry."  I say again to Jinyoung, smiling sheepishly.

"It's fine.  This is the most entertainment I've had of all the night shifts I've been on."  He smiles back.

"Can I ask you something?"  I say, a thought suddenly flying in. 

"What?"

"Didn't you hear any screaming a while ago?  Coming from outside?  About... there..?"  I point at the general direction of where it all happened.

"No, we can barely hear what's right outside of us here in this minimart."

"Really?"  I ask, skeptical for a moment.  But I toned it down.  It is true, you never hear much noise inside K-mart anyway.

"Besides, I was half asleep.  I don't know why they still put me on night shifts, to be honest." 

I laugh. 

"But why'd you ask?"  Jinyoung asks, tucking the first aid kid back under the counter. 

"Nothing." I shrug.

"Are you a detective?" 

My eyes bulge.   Me?  Detective?  I can’t even figure out what’s wrong with myself! "What?  No!  Why would you think that?"

Jinyoung shrugs. "Because that's what they usually ask.  Did you see anyone on the way to blablabla?  Did you hear anything between 3 pm to blablabla?  Stuff like that."

"Huh."  I pointlessly remark.  Someone’s been reading Lemony Snicket! "Well.  I wouldn't know.  I don't know a lot of detective stories."

"What's up?"  Kai materializes beside me with two bottles of water, a botte of milk tea and a can of peach tea.  Immediately, my heart starts pumping so fast, I might as well be doing cardio.

"What are you doing?" I ask, shocked upon seeing so many things in his hands.  Is he planning to feed the whole city or what?!

"Buying us drinks.  Why?"

"I'm only at a normal level of thirsty Kai.  Water's fine."

"You need sugar."  Kai says firmly, like he has some actual professional biological knowledge on this subject.  "You can choose between these two and leave the other for Jongguk tomorrow.  He'd like that." 

Kai being all father-y makes me smile.  "You're a great dad."  I tell him simply, making his eyes widen a bit. 

We pay and walk out, heading back for the car.  I head straight for the passenger side without thinking twice when Kai suddenly beats me to it and pulls the door open for me.  And then there it is again, the thudding in my chest, the sound of my heart beating like a drum.  In the moonlight, Kai’s tired eyes glint like black diamonds and the look he gives me is once again rooting me to the place. 

I don’t say anything, nor do I do anything either.  Right now, I could stand here looking at him forever. 

Jesus, since when was he so… beautiful?

“Get in.”  He says softly, tipping his head to the side a bit. 

I find myself slowly nodding back.  “Okay.” 

He shuts the door for me once I’m inside and I watch as he makes his way around to the driver’s seat.  Yawning, I click my seatbelt on as he enters and after starting the engine, Kai drives off. 

He drives in silence.  Kai, eyes on the road and mind in the clouds, lost in his thoughts. Behind the wheel, he looks so calm, so in control, and God, it's so magnetizing.  I tear my gaze away from him and suppress a sigh.  Staring outside the window, a certain set of lyrics float into my mind-

All we do is drive 
All we do is think about the feelings that we hide
All we do is sit in silence waiting for a sign

I close my eyes and rest my head on the headrest.  Shut up, I tell myself.  Just please shut up. There’s no feelings, no signs, no nothing!  Honestly Iseul, can you stop deluding yourself?! 

 “Are you sure you’re okay?” 

I zap back to Earth and turn to look at him.  “Huh?  Yeah, of course I’m okay.  It wasn’t me who did the fighting, was it?”

Kai’s jaw twitches.  “I prefer the term... self-and-peer defense.”

“Are you hurt anywhere?”  I ask, ignoring him.

“Right now?”  He looks at me, and I nod once. 

He smiles a tiny half-smile.  “Nope.”

The elevator gives an all-too-familiar ding and the doors slide open before us, revealing the floor of penthouse suits that all belong to Kai and his friends.

"Do you have any classes tomorrow?"

"Not really... my schedule is all over the place now that we're done with everything.  We're just preparing for the graduation ceremony and the undergrad ball that I mentioned before."  I yawn, unlocking the door and opening it.  "Goodnight Kai.  I'm going to crash and-- holy !"

"What?"  Kai asks, and instantly his eyes darken. 

"I told them to watch over Jongguk, not  wreck up chaos!!"  He yells.  "YAH!!" 

I wince at the loudness of his voice but none of the 5 drunk, sleeping men on Kai's floor do the same-- which totally defeats the whole purpose of his yell in the first place.

"Oh for God's sake... I should give them an alcohol ban!!  They always drink like they're perfectly fine with living without a liver."  He rants as he steps over the 'dead' bodies, one by one.  "And would you just inhale the scent of this place!!  It smells like I've painted the walls with alcohol!  I'm not even sure if that thing in Hawaii's fish bow is still water!" 

I giggle a little and glance over at Hawaii, who, if you've forgotten, is our pet fish that Jongguk bought when we went on a little Target shopping haul a while ago.

Kai sniffs a little.  "My couch smells like alcohol too!  And the FLOOR!!  These morons definitely spilled some!!"

I teeter over to where Kai is standing to get a whiff and yep-- he's absolutely right.  This place could be set as an attraction at theme parks named Housewives/Grandma/Cleaning lady Terrors.  .  Or if we took a picture of these guys on Kai's floor, it could be titled something like 'Failure of 5 Moms in Raising Their Sons'.

"YAHH!!!"  Kai yells, poking the snout of one of the bottles at Suho.  "CLEAN.  UP!!"

Suho groans and goes back to being dead.

"I'm going to throw you all out with the trash!!!"  Kai threatens again, throwing the plastic bag the boys brought in before all this happened on Sehun's face.  A small area on the part above Sehun’s nose flutters up and down slightly as the guy continues to snore.

"At this rate, they wouldn't even have noticed if some psycho broke in and took Jongguk away!!"  I watch Kai as he finally gives up on his unresponding audience of 5 and heads over to Jongguk's room to check on him.  He opens the door slowly and walks in.  I follow him in and see him... check the pulse on Jongguk's sleeping figure.  Crazy guy, but I yawn loudly instead of saying that out loud. 

Kai looks up.  He frowns.  "What are you doing?  You should to to sleep."

Right.  What am I doing here?  I stick out my tongue.  "Bye." 

I plod back to my room, but as I approach I realize that the door is open.  That's odd.  I definitely would close it before I leave.  I wonder why it's open? 

The answer then appears in the corner of my eye.  I see the box of tissue that's supposed to be in my room lying near Chanyeol's feet.  Tch, boys!  Can't take anything and actually give it back.  I crouch down to take it, but another thing catxhes my eye.  A polaroid photo, lying near to it. 

Taking it closer for a better inspection, I realize that it's one of mine (well duh, who else would have a polaroid photo in this house?)  It's a picture of me and Suzy during a trip to Jeju the summer we graduated high school.  Why would it be here?  Did one of the guys take it on purpose?  To show the others a pretty friend of mine?  And then later on ask me who it is, what's her name, can I have her number and can you bring me up in a conversation and put in a few good words about me while you're at it please?

I sigh.  It's entertaining the first few times because you get to befriend a few cute guys who want to hit on Bae Suzy, but it gets annoying when time after time all they want really is just Suzy.  I'm like the DUFF, between us two.  Which is not cool at all, to be honest. 

Even Mark, even though I hate to admit it.  Maybe he asked me out to see the Hamilton musical so that it won't be weird if he asked Suzy to come along too?  If that's the case then I hope--

"What are you doing, giving Chanyeol's feet a close inspection?" 

I jump and turn around.  Kai is leaning on the doorframe, leaning that James Dean lean with his arms crossed and one eyebrow raised. 

"I uh, I just saw my tissue box there, next to Chanyeol's feet and I just bent down to take it."  I explain, standing back up.

"Seems like a long time to take 1 tissue box to me."  Kai says.

"Yeah, well, I got distracted by thinking how he'd end up gay, actually."  I lie, maybe not the best lie ever.  "I didn't see him as the.. kind.. you know?  I mean there's nothing wrong with it, but he just didn't seem... well, he hid it pretty well, and I guess I just didn't see it coming."  Keep going Iseul.  You know how liars get caught?  They say too much.

I hide the polaroid under the box of tissues.

Kai cracks a smile.  "You should've seen how he was with Baekhyun ever since the dude started learning how to wear eyeliner."

I laugh.  "He's better than me, I have to say."

Kai gives me another one of those miniscule, corner-of-the-lip smiles of his again and heads to his own room. 

"Get some sleep, Iseul."  He says as he opens the door.

"Kai?"  I call, acting quickly. 

He looks at me questioningly.

"Thank you.  Thank you for the midnight adventure I've never had anything like before.  Thanks for the tickets, the food, even though you forced me to mortally embarrass myself back there, thanks for coming to save me and beating the out of them and-- OH!!  You didn't kill that other guy right?!  I mean, not that I wouldn't want that figuratively, but literally  is a bit too.. harsh?  And God, what if the cops found him and--"

"I didn't kill him.  I just knocked him out for a good twenty minutes, or half an hour at the most.  There's this pressure point-- you know what?  Come here.  I'll teach you.  You never know when you might need to knock a guy down." 

"Uh.. huh?" 

Kai wrinkles his nose impatiently but heads over to me anyway.  He stands in front of me, and I see him hesitate for a while, before asking, "Uh.. may I?"

"May you what?"  I ask, like the moron I always am. 

Kai lets out a small you're-so-dense sigh.  He reaches over, slides his hand under my hair and places his hand on the back of my neck, instantly sending my senses into overdrive.  .  .  !!  HEART!  YOU CAN ING CALM DOWN NOW!!!

"Right below your skull-- right here.."  he says softly, his fingers rest on a certain spot on the back of my neck.  "You feel this hollow part here?" 

"Yeah."  I breathe, not entirely sure of what I should be feeling right now. 

"This is one of the many pressure points in your body."  He says, his lips making love instead of sense in my ears.  .  God, I want them all over me.

WAIT, did I really just think that?  , Iseul, .  You're losing your !!

"And this goes sort of like acupuncture, so if you apply a but of pressure here-- just press like, you want to, um, pop a very stubborn bubble wrap--"

"Prfftt!!"  I snort, laughing a bit.

"Yah, pay attention!  Anyway, you'll find it in this hollow spot right here so you can't miss it.  Because once you land on it, you'll have to press on it right away.  You can't go-- oh, wait, was it here or a little bit to the left?  And then start pressing a little all over the back of your target's neck like an idiot-- that's not how knocking someone out works, you here me?  So you have to mentally prepare yourself for it, and once you lay your fingers on the spot you have to instantly apply pressure and press down.  No hesitation.  Just send him to sleep.  Other places to knock someone out are at the back of one's head, or just give them a straight upward-ing punch, from the jaw.  Or you know, you can always do the thing girls do-- knee to the balls."

"Thanks for the self-defense crash course, but I don't think I can do it.  I'll just, um, pepper spray my way out of danger."  I grin.

"Or you can always call me.  You have to remember that.  In fact, put me on speed dial.  That'll make things easier."

"Arrasso,  put me in your favourites list too then!!"  I say, teasing him back.

"Already have."

.  , now I'm never going to stop thinking about my number on Kai's 'Favourites' list.  Am I topping it?  Is Minah there as well?  Does he ing mean it??!

"I'm flattered."  I drawl, mockingly holding a hand to my heart. 

"Don't be."  Kai glares.  "You're not topping it."

"Why can't I top?"  I shoot back, my better judgements not quite with me.

"Why should you top?"  He asks, smirking now.

"Because I wanna top."  I say cheekily but confidently, smirking shamelessly at how all my morals are flying out of the window.  This is why I should never stay up past 2 am, let alone be allowed interacting with other humans!

"Maybe I'll let you top... one day."  He murmurs as he brushes back a lock of hair from my neck, his fingers ghosting upon it.  His bedroom eyes, and his voice—oh God,  so low and husky and utterly y....  .  Just ….

I hope he's not only talking about the stupid Favs list. 

And I hope my brain cells quickly rearrange themselves into the properly functioning position they should be in!!

"One day.."  I echo brainlessly.  My witty tongue and retorts are like a fuse that go out way too fast the moment someone blindsides me.

"But I'll still have to teach you better self-defense before that."  He mumbles quickly, sort of to himself, before stepping away.  "Go to sleep.  Your eyes are tired."

"You too."  I say, looking at him.  My heart starts palpitating again and I lean my back on my door.  "Thank you.  Thank you for last night.  I-- Kai, I had lots of fun I'd probably wouldn't have the luxury of experiencing if it weren't for you."

"I know."  He smiles cheekily.  I roll my eyes.  I thank him and all he says is 'I know'.

I glare at him.  "Good if you know."  I say, opening my door.  "Night."

"Night."  He says, tilting his head to side and giving me that half-lipped lazy smile, that's just so... Ooooh. 

I go in and throw myself on my bed, falling asleep with snaps and flashes of Kai and his lazy smile playing seamlessly through my mind like an endless television reel.

Why.  In the world.  Did I believe Suzy when she said she would be here?

I should’ve known better.  Being her friend for around… 8 years already, I shou